Farangs, and Farang

Although Amira originally went to Thailand with the intention of teaching English at Bangkok Thonburi University, the devastating floods that region suffered in the fall kept many schools closed well into the semester, including BTU.  After about six weeks it was clear another plan would have to be made, and Amira settled on teaching at an elementary school in rural Thailand in a province called Rayong.  There was one teacher, Pueng, at the school who spoke English, and Amira lived with Pueng's aunt at the family compound in what appeared to be the middle of the jungle.  

To thank them all we hosted a dinner for about a tenth of Amira's host family's immediate extended family (even including the great-grandmother in lime green jacket - see below)

at an outdoor restaurant and resort in a beautifully landscaped lagoon, complete with black swans, peacocks, and moonlit ponds.  The individual gifts for the sixteen family members scheduled to attend that I had hastily gathered before the trip were received with great hilarity, given that most of them were items they had never seen before (and were regrettably unlikely to ever use), but it was nonetheless great fun. Only Pueng spoke any English, but there was such jolly good will and endless smiling on everyone's part that it didn't appear to matter in the least that no one had any idea at all of what was being said.  We all just babbled away obliviously, nodding like bobble dolls and laughing at the cheerful absurdity of the occasion.

Earlier we had, at last, met the real reason for our trip to Thailand, Farang.

Farang means foreigner in Thai (originally referring to the French, who were the first colonizers of Thailand).  The puppy above, while indigenous to Thailand, is somewhat ironically named, but that's our Mersey - ever the quick wit.

It was shortly after she had despairingly noted she had seen 52 stray dogs on her way to school one morning, and only 50 the following day, that she began to talk of one particular puppy she couldn't get off her mind.  He looked curiously like our beloved Karma, who died last summer at the dignified age of 13 but whose loss was among our most painful.  Karma himself resembled a puppy Mark had found in 1975 while traveling in Turkey and had, with great effort, sent from the Shah's Iran home to Long Island. 

Karma is pictured below.  You'll no doubt see the resemblance to Farang.

Evidently there is a gene for adopting stray puppies from foreign countries beginning with the letter "T", because Amira quickly began hatching her plans for a repeat performance of the canine rescue her dad had so successfully orchestrated 37 years ago.

Mira's rescue was its own tour de force, requiring finding a Thai veterinarian who spoke English; countless phone calls to those who didn't speak English regarding regulations for transporting a dog out of the country; and a series of vet visits for health checks, immunizations, and micro-chipping.  

Then, just when it looked like all was well, Farang came down with parvovirus.

Half of all stray dogs in Thailand get either parvo, distemper or rabies.  As you might guess, they don't get treatment and thus live and die wretchedly.  Farang's odds were not good.  Amira spent hours and hours at the vet while he was given IVs.  She fretted and anguished as if she was his mother.  

But he survived.

We met Farang only briefly at the hut of his current "owners," who had coincidentally become attached to him in the meantime and who were only able to relinquish rights to him for 5000 baht, about the equivalent of $165.00.  Well, money is no object where our family's pets are concerned, and besides, the couple were infertile and were trying to adopt a child.  We figured it was a ransom well-spent.

Mark had previously ordered a canine carrier which we brought on the flight here, and Farang is now scheduled to arrive in Seattle on March 16th on a KLM flight through Amsterdam.  We will greet him at the airport and bring him home, Buddha willing.  For now, we were slated to stay overnight at the Novotel Rayong Rim Pae Resort and then hop a ferry the next morning from the Ban Pe pier in Rayong and repair ourselves to the tropical paradise that is Koh Samet.

The Rim Pae Resort in rural Rayong was intended to be the equivalent of the bridesmaid to the "bride" of our Koh Samet resort, but we were pretty blown away by its loveliness even if it wasn't the main event.  It was situated on beautifully landscaped grounds,

right near the ocean,

in addition to having a lovely adjacent pool,

being investigated by a familiar fellow who appears to believe he can walk on water.

From our hotel room we had a very lovely view of the surrounding attractions,

and in the main it was so lovely we seriously wondered why we wouldn't just stay there for the duration of our visit.  However, somewhere even more beautiful awaited us at Koh Samet.